Netanyahu Rejects Ceasefire: “Israel’s Second War of Independence Will Be Long”

Today on Sekulow, Netanyahu rejects a ceasefire saying Israel's second war of independence will be long. Keeping you informed and engaged, now more than ever, this is Sekulow. We want to hear from you. Share and post your comments or call 1-800-684-3110. And now your host, Jordan Sekulow. Alright, welcome to Sekulow. We are taking your calls to 1-800-684-3110.

That's 1-800-684-3110. You're seeing it from the world. This calls for ceasefire, this call to end the conflict, but very clear language from Prime Minister Netanyahu, who said that this is Israel's second war of independence and it will be long and it will be tough. This is not going to be a short incursion into the Gaza Strip. And even as you're seeing in the news, Israel going a step closer into Gaza City.

It's small steps. It's not mass, it's not a shock and awe ground invasion that we have seen at this point. In fact, they have not even used the word, the Israelis have not used the word invasion when they've been talking about it at this point. You've seen the Internet be cut off, the Internet be turned back on, back and forth exchanges about will hostages come out, then they didn't come out and then the war kind of restarts. So, where is Israel right now?

In a position where most of the world is calling for a ceasefire, it's got to be the U.S. that really has Israel's back and keeps the world from pushing too hard. And that makes it that much more complicated because many of these countries have hostages in Gaza. So, we're expecting also that the number of hostages is going to increase to about 280 is what they're saying now. And it could be more. And representative of over, initially they thought it was about 40 countries.

I think they're now thinking it's maybe 30 or 25 or 30. So, you are going to have this world opinion that's going to be starting to say, hey, look, don't, you know, if we could get a ceasefire, maybe we can get the hostages out. Israel's position is that an aggressive move by the Israelis will, in fact, increase the chances of the hostages being released because it's going to put so much pressure on Hamas.

The area is booby-trapped. Israel's moving in very slow. As you know, and we've talked about it briefly on this broadcast, but Jordan, as you know, I have been on calls every day, morning and then again at night with Israeli lawyers that are representing hostage families. I'm going to be meeting with some of them next week in our offices in Washington, D.C. We are looking at contemplating legal action at the United Nations. We want to put the United Nations in a bit of a vice here. There is a committee, and I know when C.C. Hall joins us, she's going to explain what we're going to do. But there's a committee we can go to when someone's been taken captive like this.

So, the reality is this is a multi-prong issue. At the same time, every move of Israel, they're worrying about the Israeli legal department has to worry about war crime issues. And are the people going to say it? And is world opinion changed? Now, Macron said something very interesting yesterday, and I thought this was fascinating. He said, you know, maybe we need an international military coalition to go in and take out Hamas like they did ISIS. And I thought that was very, very interesting. The shock, I think, has to be Hillary Clinton's statement about the ceasefire and Hamas. Take a listen. People who are calling for a ceasefire now do not understand Hamas. That is not possible. It would be such a gift to Hamas because they would spend whatever time there was a ceasefire, in effect, rebuilding their armaments.

You know, creating stronger positions to be able to fend off an eventual assault by the Israelis. I wish Joe Biden would say that. I mean, if you give me a choice right now, you have to have a Democratic candidate. It's going to be Hillary Clinton or Joe Biden.

Give me Hillary Clinton. Because she gets it. I mean, but the White House isn't making these statements. That's the problem. I think the White House is the opposite. They're putting pressure on for a ceasefire. Yeah, I mean, it's very unclear. You get John Kirby up there.

When you get John Kirby up there, it's all over the place. How many Americans are hostages? Less than 10. Well, how many? Well, less than 10. Can you give me a number? No.

And then, you know, you get the back and forth. Are you the reason they turned the Internet back on? Maybe, maybe not.

Third question. OK, yeah, we are the reason they turned the Internet back on. Great. Give Hamas the Internet back. I mean, that's coming from the U.S. I mean, so while Biden says we have their back, it's how long? I mean, that's what Israel's got to be concerned about and why. Listen, an international coalition to say Hamas is ISIS and we all need to destroy this group. Is it an interesting play?

It's whether or not it would ever come together because it would have to kind of base in Israel. A huge thank you to our ACLJ champions. I'm going to give you that number when we come back from the break. Fantastic. Back with more in a moment. Welcome back to Secular. We are taking your phone calls to 1-800-684-3110. That's 1-800-684-3110.

I want to play the sound. I know it's translated, but it's from Prime Minister Netanyahu. I'm talking about the seriousness of this conflict compared to the other conflicts we've talked about in this broadcast over the last 20 years. Or even been in Israel during conflicts that were much different than this in the last 20 years. Listen to how he explains it and how it's translated from Hebrew into English about this conflict, about what Israelis are preparing for, how they see this war with Hamas, and how they see the length and how difficult it will be.

Take a listen. The war within the Gaza Strip will be harsh and long, but we are ready. This is our second war of liberation. We are going to fight to protect the country. We are going to fight. We will not replete by land, by sea, by air. We shall eliminate the enemy on top of the land and the bottom. And we shall prevail.

It will be the good over evil, light over darkness, life over death. In this war, we are standing together. But, I mean, you realize, Dad, that kind of rhetoric is not similar to the previous, I'd say, four or five conflicts that Israel's engaged in, which were difficult but already would have been over with at this point. Well, I think Benjamin Netanyahu is in a very difficult spot. He has to play, and I say play too, he's got to deal with Israeli citizens that right now are still in shock.

Sure. He's got to deal with an international audience that initially was supportive of him, but as time goes on, it changes. So this goes back to what we always say about the Middle East, Andy, and that is nine-dimensional chess.

Well, that's exactly right, Jay. These are really difficult moves to make, difficult decisions to undertake because one decision that you make has an impact in 12 and 13 different ways all over the Middle East. You've got Iran to think of. You have Syria to think of. You have Lebanon and Hezbollah. You've got Hamas and Gaza. You've got the Israeli situation. You have American fleet off in the eastern Mediterranean.

You've got riots and protests in London and in New York and Brooklyn and cities in Europe and so forth. So these decisions are very difficult to make, and I hate to be Prime Minister Netanyahu having to be in the driver's seat to make these terrible choices on what is good and what is bad for Israel. But he has made it very clear that he is going to protect his country and he's going to fight, and there's not going to be any retreat, and I think that's the only way that he can do at this point. Israel was attacked on October 2nd, 7th. Israel did nothing to provoke that attack. And just like Pearl Harbor, and I think he said that, just like 9-11 in New York in 2001, these are unprovoked, premeditated attacks, and Israel's got to do it for what?

It's survival, literally. So the UN agency in Gaza, of course, is urging a ceasefire, as is a lot of the country, and now they're saying it's a matter of life and death for millions of Palestinians, but it's also a matter of life and death for the nation state of Israel. And let me tell you one thing that's going on right now, and that is we're going to be meeting next week in our offices in Washington with some of the hostage families representatives, these mothers and fathers, sisters and brothers of hostages. And we have our legal team at the ACLJ, in conjunction with our multiple offices that were involved in this, have come up with a method upon which we can go to the UN, at least put the UN in a vice here, so that they understand this is not a one-way street.

Cece, explain to people what we're able to do, and we think that by next week we will actually be in a position to do this. Yeah, so there is a working group at the United Nations, similar to the working group in arbitrary detention, which we have gone before several times. It's the working group in voluntary disappearance, and so there is a procedure where we can do communications with this working group on behalf of the hostages through their families to make, actually demand Hamas to, the UN demands Hamas to say where these hostages are and to release them. And so it's again just one more step that we can take to bring attention to the fact that Hamas has hostages, civilian innocent hostages that they have done atrocities to, that they need to release.

Because too often we hear about, oh, human rights that Israel has violated, which is ridiculous, they have not, they've been attacked, but we need to bring attention to the human rights violations that Hamas has done. I hope to have that in place later this week and ready for filing Monday. Before the families arrive, I would like to have that in place. Yeah, we're going to go to phones. If you want to talk to us on the air, if you've got questions about how complicated this is, and there's no bad questions to ask, 1-800-684-3110, and you're hearing so many different things, we're covering it all. 1-800-684-3110 to talk to us on the air. Joe is calling in from New York on Line 2. Hey, Joe, welcome to Secula. Well, thank you for taking my question, and keep the pairs going for Israel.

Thank you. My question is, if Turkey gets involved in the war against Israel, how does Israel combat Turkey as well? Okay, you just, let me tell you the reaction of my colleague Andy O'Connell when you said that. This is perhaps the most dangerous aspect of this. First of all, Turkey's supposedly a NATO ally.

Secondly, they have a large military and they have a lot of money. It would be dramatic. I don't know if Erdogan will do it. He's dangerous. He's radical. Do you think he would go this far?

Yes, I do. I have a word for him which I cannot use on air, and in the interest of full disclosure, I am of Greek ancestry, so I can tell you what the Turks have done to the Greeks through the years. But Erdogan is a very bad actor and a very bad character. He is no respecter of human rights. He is no respecter of religious rights. He is no respecter of civil liberties of any kind. He is a ruthless dictator, and what he may do may bring the whole world into conflict because, strictly speaking, if there is conflict between Israel and Turkey as a NATO nation, he has the right to call upon – does he not, Jay – other NATO nations to come to the defense of Turkey.

This would be – this is the absurdity of what would happen here. Yeah, I mean, I think, again, when it comes to Erdogan, I heard the White House even say that in their position they're like, you know, we don't agree with everything he says, and they think it's words at this point. But, I mean, they have F-35s. Yeah. Now, supposedly we have the kill switch on those.

Do you believe that? I mean, I think, again, there would be a lot of U.S. pressures saying if you try to use those F-35s, you know, we're the ones who constructed those, don't know if they're going to work when you try to attack Israel. And, remember, we also have tradees there trading these guys on how to use this equipment. But the problem with those NATO allies like Turkey is they have the equipment at our level. It's our level of equipment. Yeah. I mean, it's actually – It's very sophisticated weaponry. Better weaponry than Israel would have.

Yeah. And here's the other aspect. We know this from Turkey because we dealt with Turkey. I mean, their human rights record, see, she's not exactly stellar.

We had the Brunson case came out of there. We know the repression. That's if you're a religious minority in Turkey, what it's like. This is serious.

It is serious. And just like Andy said, Erdogan is, you know, not a bastion of human rights. He's not the one who's going to play along the game of protecting human rights. So, you know, hopefully he would think that Israel and the United States together is maybe more than Turkey should take on. And I would hope that that would deter him. But you never know because, again, he has the alliance with the Muslim states and the Muslim countries. And, you know, their unity is very strong. The push – this pressure on the ceasefire is unrelenting.

You have no idea. Folks, I'm dealing with the lawyers that deal with this. So we're dealing with – it's unrelenting. Let's go ahead and take Todd's call out of Georgia.

Hey, Todd, welcome to Secula. If you want to talk to us again on the air, any questions on Israel, the U.S. response, the international response, 1-800-684-3110. I don't want you to be afraid of any question. There's no bad questions here. It's a very complicated situation.

It changes overnight in the U.S. because it's during the day there. You've got new international actors speaking on it, making threats on it every day. So give us your calls. Give us your questions. And so we can get you the best info so that when you're talking to your friends about it, you can give them the best info. 1-800-684-3110 to talk to us.

Yeah, let's hold – tell Todd to hang on because we're getting close to the break because I need to do something here. And that is a huge thank you to our ACLJ friends that became champions. We had an initial goal of 1,500.

We had a stretch goal of 2,000. As of today, and we have today to go, we have 2,000 and I believe it was 38 new ACLJ champions. Now what that means is we've got a lot of you that are now standing with us for, in this particular month, Israel.

They're champions for life, liberty and freedom. But it affects – they're champions for everything we do, including keeping this broadcast on the air five days a week, on our social media applications, on the radio stations we're on. So – but from all of us at the ACLJ, we want to say a huge thank you. We were – when we hit 1,500, we were thrilled. When we did the stretch goal, the 2,000, we all said, you know, we may be able to get it to 1,600, 1,700.

That would be great. But we did – we did, in fact, exceed 2,000. And that's a huge accomplishment.

And for that, we want to say a huge thank you. These are people that are standing with the ACLJ in monthly giving. Yeah, and I want you to know, you can still become a monthly donor right now. You go to ACLJ.org slash champions. So if you're someone who wants to commit to that monthly donation, it's not over. You can absolutely do that at any time.

Go to ACLJ.org slash champions. But thank you for helping us get to that over 2,000 recurring donors, which, again, helps us plan, especially for these events that you can't plan for, that you don't know are going to happen. And you don't know exactly that. I think, you know, in these situations, what we might be called on to assist with can be very different than what we were called on to assist with even two or three years ago.

That's exactly right. And we know we're working with the hostage families. We know there's going to be international law of armed conflict issues that are already coming up. We had our European office already successfully get a resolution out of the European Parliament, which was unheard of. Our DCT team is very engaged.

DCT is active right now. On both sides of the aisle. Yeah, both sides of the aisle.

Republicans and Democrats. We had meetings with them and contacts with those offices daily. We just got off the phone with them. So the ACLJ is fully engaged. Again, as Jordan said, you can become an ACLJ champion. Go to ACLJ.org slash champion.

That means become a monthly donor to the American Center for Law and Justice. Back with more in a moment. Welcome back to Secchio. We do want to take Todd's call. We were trying to get to that last segment, but we want to make sure to thank those ACLJ champions who signed up over this last month, over 2000 of you, which is unbelievable.

You can still sign up to become a recurring donor, a monthly donor to the ACLJ at ACLJ.org slash champions. Todd from Georgia, you are on the air. Yes, sir. My question is regarding the international law of armed conflict. Could Israel reclaim Gaza the same way that happened in 1967 with the Six Day War? You know, the promised land was promised to the descendants of Isaac, not Ishmael, and Hamas is the one who attacked Israel.

Well, look, it's interesting. I don't know if you've noticed this, and I don't know if people are picking this up, but as Israel is making its incursions into Gaza, let me tell you what they're planting. The Israeli flag. And I think the symbolism in that culture, in that community, in the Semitic world is very significant. And the flag, Andy, being planted, whether they continue to govern or not, is very symbolic.

Absolutely. And I think the fact that they planted the flag is making a statement with respect to reclaiming this territory that rightfully belongs to them. Because not only in Israel and in the war, but in the world generally, symbolism has a great deal to do with how you conduct diplomacy and foreign policy, and in this case, how you conduct war. When they go in there and they put a flag in the land, that is saying this is now Israeli territory, Jay. Yeah, so that's where that is. It was a great question, we appreciate it.

We'll take more calls at 800-684-3110. Interesting tie-in, Jordan, coming up politically. We want to get yours and Harry's comments on this. Yeah, I mean, you've got, again, what's interesting right now is what's happening in the US. This is actually just Christopher Wray, he's in a hearing right now.

I want to play this, actually. Talking about the Jewish community around the world, you saw what happened in Russia. In Dagestan. And the Russians are trying to protect, and the military, they're trying to make sure, but there are people being assaulted. Ready to kill Jews coming up the airplane. Oh yeah, there's guys surrounding people, taking their passports, seeing if they're Jews, all this info.

Christopher Wray just testified at the Senate Homeland Security Committee. I mean, we're in 2023, and this is how we're talking about Jews in the United States of America and around the world, Bite 34. The reality is that the Jewish community is uniquely, uniquely targeted by pretty much every terrorist organization across the spectrum. And when you look at a group that makes up 2.4% roughly of the American population, it should be jarring to everyone that that same population accounts for something like 60% of all religious-based hate crimes. And so they need our help. Yeah.

Well, they do need your help. And meanwhile, the universities are on fire. And I got to tell you something, it's outrageous. Emory University's President has spoken out against this. I haven't seen any other major universities at this point speak out against this. Harry, you have been an academic for most of your career, a good portion of your career, you still have academic affiliations. The campuses are all, if you're a Jewish student on the campus, you're not wearing your Star of David.

You know, if you are, you're willing to take the risk. Absolutely. And so what we are seeing unfolding on campuses throughout the United States and throughout the Western world is a profusion of anti-Jewish hate. So you have university students who have labeled Israel as an oppressor. Basically, then they argue that legitimates any attempt to stop Jewish Americans from expressing support for Israel, including cutting decapitation or some other form of violence. There's a recent article that's out and it's authored by Kristin Kristin, a British commentator, and it's called The Day the Delusions Died. The Day the Delusions Died is indeed October the 7th because it's exposed the soft underbelly of anti-Jewish hate throughout the world. In the United States, in London, in Paris, in Rome, wherever you go, you will now find expressions of anti-Jewish hate.

And they're even basically tying themselves to Adolf Hitler. So the ACLJ and other organizations need to be prepared to fight back and fight back vigorously. There have been new ideas posed by the Speaker, Mike Johnson, the new Speaker of the House. He's introduced a supplemental appropriations package. It would provide $14 billion in military assistance to Israel in exchange for slashing an equal amount of IRS funding. So that instead of just funding money in that $80 billion to the IRS, send it to Israel when they really need it. The question will be, can you get any bipartisan support on that? Because there's an issue here with getting both funding to Israel and also, do we have the equipment to send? Would they need to rearm the Iron Dome, which is a joint U.S.-Israel program that we help them develop so that we can also utilize it similarly on the battlefield on a smaller scale when our troops are out in a much bigger way, because we have troops all over the world, and can we rearm it? There's questions now because of how many arms have gone to Ukraine. Right. So, I mean, the money's important.

The weapons are important. I think there's wide support in America on both sides of the aisle, but there are elements on both the left and the right that don't understand why we're sending this money. Reeser Carlson has said that he doesn't know why we're supporting Israel in getting involved in this on his podcast. I mean, this is pretty scary, and that's a naive view of understanding of the Middle East, to say the least. Let's take Robert's call out of Maryland.

Yeah. My question I wanted to bring forward to the both of you is, is the United States going to respond with military retaliation as a result of the attacks on American troops, both in Iraq and Syria, during around the same time of the Gaza-Israel war that's been taking place since October 7th? Because from what Logan was telling me, and I called a couple of weeks ago, just in two weeks, there have been about seven to 13 attacks in two years. There's been 83 of them. So, Robert, they have taken direct action late last week. The President ordered strikes inside Syria.

Those were accomplished. Supposedly they were prepared to do more. They're trying to keep it very distinct from the Israel-Hamas issue because, again, and I'll go back to Andy on this, it's the symbolism, again, of trying to not make this like it's a world configuration here of an expanding war.

That's right. Which it is, let's be honest. It's not going to be an expanding war. It's going to be an expanding war. But I hope that the President of the United States makes the decision to take these strikes against the Iranians and the Iranian-backed groups as he did in eastern Syria with even greater vigor if this continues against U.S. troops.

You know, Harry, I was wondering about this. You study history. Trying to contain a conflict is always a good goal, to try to contain that conflict. The Middle East is particularly a powder keg. How do you – what does the U.S. do here, in your view, from a policy perspective? Well, I think it's very, very complicated in part because the big elephant in the room is Iran. And Iran harbors global aspirations as part of an overall Islamic war against the West. And Iran is funding much of the upheaval, the conflict throughout the world in Lebanon, in Syria, in Gaza.

And so I think the United States ultimately will have to deal directly with Iran. I'll tell you, we've got a lot more ahead. We're going to take your phone calls in the next segment, too.

1-800-684-3110. Again, a huge thank you to the 2,031 or 2,038 – I'm going to get that right – yeah, 2,038 members, new members of our champions group. And that is people that are giving monthly to the ACLJ that beat our goal, beat our stretch goal. Thank you. ACLJ.org, you can still sign up for it today.

You'll be standing with Israel, be a champion for life, liberty and freedom. ACLJ.org forward slash champions. That's ACLJ.org forward slash champions. Phone lines are jammed right now. We're going to take calls during the next segment and we'll open them up at 1-800-684-3110.

There's one line open just opened up just now. Keeping you informed and engaged, now more than ever, this is Sekulow. And now your host, Jordan Sekulow. All right, welcome back to Sekulow. Folks, we've got a lot more to talk about.

Of course, Rick Rinnell is going to be joining us in the second half of the broadcast. And there's stuff to talk about here in the U.S., what's happening around the world. We're taking your phone calls on Israel, 1-800-684-3110, but also ACLJ's domestic work. If you see our email today from the ACLJ data, it's about our representation of Agent O'Boyle and that case moving forward. Yeah, FBI whistleblower. We are in the U.S. District Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C., the D.C. Court of Appeals. That's where you start the litigation there.

And that one stop from the Supreme Court. He is not the only whistleblower we're representing. We also have Mark Zallen we're representing as well, another FBI.

He was the employee of the year for the Charlotte office. And, I mean, this is outrageous. And we've told you about these problems in the FBI and our ACLJ team's on it. We're expecting the legal response, which will probably be a motion to dismiss, from the federal government today and then we'll respond.

So we've got that going on. By the way, we also have a team of lawyers right now led by Jane Raskin, our special counsel, in Denver, Colorado on an election case involving the attempt to remove former President Trump from even being on the ballot. She made opening statements yesterday. They're in day two of that argument.

That's going to go the rest of this week. We are prepared, and we may be doing this as early as Thursday, of filing these cases at the United Nations for the hostages. So, hostage families, there's a lot going on. Let's go ahead and take a phone call. John is calling from Georgia on Line 2. John, welcome to the broadcast. You're on the air. Thank you.

Yeah, I'm just wondering, how is it in our interest to support this socialist ethnostate on the other side of the planet that blew up our battleship, that spies on us constantly, that draws us into endless proxy wars, that is comprised of the most consistently progressive demographic in the West, who's co-religionist in this country, voted for Obama by a majority of around 80%, and are, in fact, the authors of the self-same Marxism that you created to cry in the US? Yeah, let me ask you a question, John. What car do you drive? What kind of car do you drive? I drive a Mercedes. You do. You use unleaded gas? I do.

Would you like to be able to continue to get it? That's what this is about, John. Now, you think about this. It's not just the ethn- first of all, you're talking about something that happened during Israel's war of independence, okay, and actually predated the war of independence. It's in the 1940s. Lots have changed.

Israel is the most democratic state, and I'm not talking about the party, in the region. You close the Suez Canal. Remember the trouble in the Suez, 1956? Have you studied history? You sound like you know a lot of history.

I suggest you go back and read some of it, because if you want to be able to get oil in your car, gas in your car, guess what? You better have a free Israel. Now, also, do you think that these terrorist groups are just going to- where do you think we get our intelligence from?

You don't think it's with the assistance of our allies in the region? So let's- what would you have us do? Nothing and just see whatever happens, happens? Go ahead, John. It's counterintelligence.

It's the opposite of intelligence. No, no, I just asked you a question. What would you suggest we do? Israel just had to slaughter the equivalent of another Holocaust in a day. You think that's okay and we just do nothing in the United States and say, hey, sorry it happened? It's not our fight. It's not our fight. Well, let me ask you a question. Was World War II our fight?

What? Was World War II our fight? It sure as hell wasn't, as most of the American people agreed at the time.

It wasn't? No, it wasn't our fight. Oh, okay, so when they attacked Pearl Harbor, it became our fight, right?

World War II. Oh, so when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, we just say, hey, sorry, we'll- They attacked Pearl Harbor because they were given bad intelligence. You are- I don't know what conspiracy websites you're reading. I suggest you not continue to do that. Thank you for calling. I wanted to put that call on, folks, because this is how you have the anti-Semitism that we're experiencing throughout the world. When people are as ignorant is that phone call.

It is confidently- Gee whiz. The scary part of this to everybody should be people are thinking like that. It is confidently ignorant.

Yeah, confidently ignorant. Like this, what they know is truth. And again, it is very conspiratorial. War, again, no one wants wars. Israel, as well as countries that promote peace, they were attacked. They were not the aggressor. And they've constantly been attacked, like the US. We try to prevent wars, and then yet these countries still, they want to attack us.

They see us as the great evil in the world because we promote freedom, democracy, religious liberty, freedom to vote, to not support monarchies. We should be thinking long and hard about the call we just got and realize what we've got to deal with. Well, this is what's happening. It's not just conspiracy theories. This is like college campus 101 right now.

Yeah, unbelievable. Back with more in a moment. Welcome back to Secular. We're taking your calls.

1-800-684-3110. Rick Grenell is joining us now. He's the Acting Director of National Intelligence. And Rick, I want to get your comments because Christopher Wray is testifying now on Capitol Hill talking about what's going on in the Middle East and how it could be affecting Americans. I got this question a lot over the weekend, a lot of these Halloween events and kid events that we were attending in our community, and people were asking me, you know, do you think that terrorism is more likely? Are we going to see this Islamic terrorism once again inside the United States? This is what Christopher Wray just testified to on Capitol Hill.

Take a listen. The reality is that the terrorism threat has been elevated throughout 2023, but the ongoing war in the Middle East has raised the threat of an attack against Americans in the United States to a whole other level. As the FBI director, Rick, I mean, we got used to a period of time under the Trump administration, we took out ISIS, their leader, and their entire caliphate, and things kind of calmed down, and we weren't as worried about Islamic terror here in the United States.

But that only lasts usually for a few years, and then it rears its ugly head again, it rebuilds. I mean, do you agree, do Americans need to begin to worry, to think twice about where they go? Certainly some of these college campuses, these protests are becoming riots in these major cities. Look, the world is changing, and yes, we have a very serious problem. It's hard enough when the border is closed, when you have a President who really concentrates on keeping the border closed. But right now we have a whole team in Washington, D.C., that is for an open border.

They literally are failing on a monthly basis. We see tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of people coming across the border unverified without having any check on who these people are. We don't know their background.

They're not going through the DHS or the State Department process. We don't know who they are, and that creates a system where we are less safe. So I would say to Americans, because of what we have going on at the border, they need to be vigilant. They need to be watching even more closely.

I am not confident that we don't have a grip on who's inside this country, all the people who have overstayed their visas. It's a serious problem. You know, Rick, one of the issues that I'm getting, the growing anti-Semitism is, of course, unbelievably troubling with anybody with a Jewish background, too.

I mean, it's horrible. There's also another – you were the director of national intelligence, and look, this situation in the Middle East is a powder keg, it always is, and I said earlier in the broadcast you've got to think nine-dimensionally, and you and I have talked about that before. I worry about – and, you know, you had dealings with this when you were in Germany as the ambassador. You know, Erdogan's raising his sword against I'm going to come and support, you know, Hamas here. And, of course, he allows Hamas to stay there. And he's supposedly a NATO ally, Rick.

How do we handle him in this process? Look, NATO – the Turks have been in NATO since 1952. It's been a very long time, and traditionally they've been a good member of NATO. What we need right now is for Jake Sullivan and Anthony Blinken to get in a plane and go to Ankara and get in front of the Turks and talk to them. We need to engage with them.

As a member of NATO, we need to be unified with a Western-facing strategy, and that means looking at terrorists very clearly to defeat them in unison. We need to be united, and I fear right now – we've got U.S. bases in Turkey, and I fear that we just don't have a diplomatic strategy. Who is talking to Erdogan? Who is talking to the foreign minister?

We need these questions answered immediately. We've calls about it. Jack in Pennsylvania on Live 4. Hey, Jack, welcome to Secular. You're on the air.

How are you doing? Thanks for all the work that you folks do. This subject that's being talked about right now by Rick Rinnell – when NATO was established, it was established as a protective organization against the Soviet Union in the event that they would attack Western Europe. If Israel were to attack Turkey, Turkey would have a basis for calling on the rest of NATO. But if Turkey attacks Israel, that's their own choice, and NATO, I don't think, is obligated to go to their defense.

That is my interpretation. Well, you know, I don't think – I'll defer here to Rick, but NATO does not – first of all, Israel is not attacking Turkey, okay? And the second thing is if Israel – if Turkey decides to engage, I don't think they would do it directly. I think they would be funding Hamas militants with weapons and strategic advice. But, you know, it – so the NATO issue really, I think, is outside the scope of this.

The question is, Rick, containing this conflict. You always want to contain a conflict, but especially so in the Middle East. Look, I've worked at the State Department for 12 years, and I know the State Department pretty well.

Here's one important point. The U.S. ambassador to NATO reports into the State Department. They also coordinate with the Pentagon, but this is a State Department job.

Now, what does that tell you? This means that it's a diplomatic job. The U.S. ambassador to NATO has to be a very good diplomat, a diplomat first. And so what I would say is the Turks are in Brussels at NATO. We need to be coordinating with them. There should be no surprises, but there is no question that over the last couple of years we've grown increasingly concerned that Turkey is moving away from the Western alliance. And what I would say is that's where diplomacy has to come in.

We need to be very clear-eyed, and I will finish with this, is that when President Trump was in office, he had a very good relationship with Erdogan. That doesn't mean that we didn't have situations like Pastor Brunson, but it does mean that we solved situations like Pastor Brunson under Donald Trump. I think that's the leadership that's lacking.

That's what people are freaked out about, Rick. I mean, ultimately, you get these White House briefings, and you don't know what you're going to get each day. And what you likely are going to get is something that doesn't even make sense, or it's kind of jumbled, and it contradicts what another speaker is saying, maybe from the State Department, or John Kirby is saying something different than Karine Jean-Pierre, and she's not condemning this, but he's condemning that. We don't know exactly how many Americans are hostages.

It's less than 10, but we won't give you a number. And back and forth, we turn the internet back on for Hamas, and finally admitting to things like that. But at the end of the day, I think where Americans are concerned is that they want to make sure that our country and our leaders are taking it as seriously as you say they should be. They should be getting on the plane, not just commenting on it from the White House, but they need to be on the plane in Turkey handling these situations. These are our allies.

They will be with us. Look, I'm generally a very positive person, and I like to look at the glasses half full, but the reality is that this team in Washington under the Joe Biden regime, they really don't know what they're doing. I mean, you look at Anthony Blinken, and he always looks scared. There's no sense of strength from a diplomat from him. He does these crazy moves that make you think, oh, gosh, he's so weak. And then you've got Kamala Harris, the Vice President, saying things like, don't.

That's her message. It's not a credible threat of military action when you just say the word don't. And Joe Biden, of course we know he's so weak. He can't walk straight. He's stumbling.

He looks like he's declining. So when you have the combination of the President, the Vice President, and the Secretary of State all sending powerful messages of weakness, there is a cause for concern. One thing they did do, I will give them credit on this, I thought early on Ricky and I talked about this, was sending the two carrier groups.

I think there should have been more building on that, but go ahead. What people have seen is that Russia invaded Ukraine because of a weak Biden administration, a weak America. At least that's how they picture it. And then they funded Ukraine, and it's been tougher for Russia than they thought it would be. But still, they're still going on with it. It's still ongoing. It's not getting as much attention right now. And Hamas decided this was the time, and that means Iran decided this was the time, to launch the largest scale invasion into Israel and to carry out these atrocious attacks against Israelis to cut their heads off, to kill children, to take hostages. We've gone through it over and over. I don't want to keep saying it in case you're in the car with kids. But they okayed that under the Biden administration because they really don't fear them.

Can I add two points quick? Let's look at Ukraine. First of all, I blame, partly blame the Biden administration. They dropped the sanctions on the Nord Stream 2 pipeline showing weakness. The Biden administration policy was weak. And then we had the war in Ukraine. The Biden administration policy on Iran giving them 6 billion plus in credits or money. And then we had the October 7th attacks on Israel.

I think that when you have weak policies and you make moves with weakness, you message to our enemies and to others that they can make a move on us. No doubt about it. Thank you, Rick. We appreciate it as always. Folks, we have people like Rick Connell and Mike Pompeo and Tulsi Gabbard and others on this team because of your support of the ACLJ. And to the 2,038 brand new, which is a great number, champions, thank you. This is your last day to do it for this month. Go to ACLJ.org forward slash champions.

Still time to do it. ACLJ.org forward slash champions. You'll be a champion for life, liberty and freedom. And of course, that means you're just making a monthly gift to the ACLJ. I think it was our biggest day of champions was yesterday. Largest number of champions we've ever had sign up in a day.

ACLJ.org slash champions. We're taking your calls in the last segment here. So if you're on the line, hang in there. We're going to get right back to them. 800-684-3110.

Back with more in a moment. Welcome back to second. We're going to take your calls.

1-800-684-3110. We've seen, again, not just a rise in anti-Semitism in the Muslim world in the Middle East, but on college campuses here in the United States and around Western Europe as well. We've seen huge protests, anti-Israel protests. They used to be very careful in their protests. They used to say it's anti-Israel, it's not about Jews.

Now, they don't make that distinction anymore. It's about Jews. I mean, Jewish students are being told on campus who might not be Israeli at all, you know, don't go to the Jewish center at the school because, you know, it's going to be protests and we can't keep you safe. It's not the Israeli center. It's the Jewish center.

Yeah, no, it's sick. We're going to take your calls in the order that you called in. 1-800-684-3110. We're going to start with William on line one in Nevada.

William, go ahead. Yeah, if things got worse for Israel and say Iran and Turkey decided to have like a full-scale war, do you think Israel would ever use their nukes? I think they would only use a nuclear weapon, even a tactical nuclear weapon, if it was absolutely necessary for the survival of the Jewish state. Let me just say this, the Jewish state will survive. So, that's kind of a roundabout way of saying nothing's ever going to be off the table right now. This was, you know, never again was today. That's what Benjamin Netanyahu said yesterday. He said, we say never again, never again is today. And when you see the brutality of what's happening, like Jordan said, we're respecting people that have this in their car, we're listening with their kids, so we're not going to get into the details of what's happened.

But you've seen these reports, folks, and I am telling you right now, Israel do whatever they have to do. Hopefully it doesn't come to that. I pray it doesn't come to that. They don't want it to come to that.

Nothing's off the table. No, of course not when you're dealing with powers the size of Iran, who are rapidly trying to develop. If they don't already have it. Right, a nuclear weapon. And that's based off intelligence, we don't think they have a deliverable weapon at this point. But again, right.

I mean, that's again, when you give them $6 billion and maybe they could speed that process up or buy one from North Korea. Go back to the phones, 1-800-684-3110. Tim calling from California Online 4.

Hey, Tim. Thank you for taking my call. How do we get the Biden administration to stop urging a ceasefire and back in Netanyahu? Well, we need to talk to our members of Congress, which we, our government affairs team is doing as we speak. We have to continue to have the Israeli prime minister and those in the war cabinet come out and say what they're saying. Hillary Clinton's comment was extremely helpful.

In fact, I will play it again. This was the former Democratic nominee for President, the former secretary of state, a Democrat. This is what Bill, this is what Joe Biden should be listening to. Hillary Clinton. People who are calling for a ceasefire now do not understand Hamas.

That is not possible. It would be such a gift to Hamas because they would spend whatever time there was a ceasefire in effect rebuilding their armaments, you know, creating stronger positions to be able to fend off an eventual assault by the Israelis. So far, the administration has not gone to the step of saying there needs to be a ceasefire today. We haven't seen, they have basically agreed with the statement that a ceasefire would just benefit Hamas. That being said, they're the last remaining country basically in the world other than Israel at the U.N. And the pressure is high on the U.S. because it's not just that there are some Americans being held hostage, but there's people from 27 or 28 other countries being held hostage and those countries are saying, well, at least need a ceasefire so that we can get our citizens out and then, you know, they could go back to conflict. The problem is to get there when Hamas wants 6,000 terrorists released. Right. This is so that they will release 200 or something innocent people. Yeah.

I mean, it's ridiculous. Colin is calling from California, Line 5. Go ahead. You're on the air. Hi. Did you say – Colin, you said me, right? Yes. Yeah, sorry. Yeah, I – thank you for taking the call and appreciate you guys' quality and integrity of your program. Thanks.

And prayers are with you. My question was, they say that they're going in to destroy Hamas, but how will they know – once they do go in, how will they know that that has been completed? I mean, these people don't have Hs on their head. No, they don't wear uniforms. They don't operate under the laws of armed conflict. But the Israeli intelligence knows where the rockets are being flown out of. They have on-ground intelligence showing where they – a lot of these facilities, a lot of the Hamas command centers are underneath hospitals. So the Israelis know that, and that's why this is a little bit more painstaking and slower than people anticipated.

This is because of exactly what you said. They don't wear uniforms. You don't have a marked enemy, so to speak.

Yeah. I mean, they do have some special forces, Hamas, that would be more easily identifiable. That's probably who Israel is battling with right now. I mean, we're hearing that Israel is battling with Hamas in tunnels as we speak. Two IDF soldiers were killed today in battles in Gaza.

And that's early on. I mean, this is just barely reaching over the border into Gaza. So I think that what we are going to learn is that the Hamas of 2023, as they get further into Gaza, is a much more lethal Hamas than the Hamas that we would be near those rockets. We'd be near those rockets, really not concerned for our life. No, I think that's 100 percent. We'd be there, the rockets become – I wasn't worried about dying. No, exactly right.

And neither were most Israelis. No. You get to the bomb shelter, you'll be safe. Yep.

It wasn't a pleasant way to live, but you weren't going to die, and you weren't worried about them coming over the border and cutting your head off. Nope. Let's go to John's call from Illinois. John, you're on the air.

Thank you for taking my call today. My question is, why can't the Palestinians just re-migrate to Egypt, Turkey, Syria, Iran, as opposed to sitting here trying to hold out a 25-by-11-mile sector? Yeah, so here's why. They don't want them in there because they don't know if their Hamas infiltrates themselves.

There's no way to identify. And that's what they're concerned about. That's why they're closing down their borders, because they do not want Hamas in there who works with the Muslim Brotherhood, who el-Sisi, the President of Egypt, has so far successfully dismantled. But you put in 200,000 or 400,000 people into your country that are coming out of Gaza, you're going to have Hamas militants in that group that they don't want. Yeah, I mean, those countries have experienced their own terrorism when they have allowed the Palestinians into their countries, including killing of their own leaders, the assassination of their leaders, Islamic leaders. So that's why.

They are known as a group that can't be trusted, that is violent, and that will violently oppose even the governments who are trying to assist their people as they come in. So that's why you see these border crossings stay closed or very limited openings. It's not just the Israelis closing those down.

It's the Arab world as well. Let's take the last call. Yeah, Lewis in Colorado on Line 3.

Hey, Lewis. Yeah, I'm just going online to donate now. Thank you. You're welcome. Just a quick to counter that other guy.

Yeah. If we want to be blessed, we've got to bless Israel. Jerusalem is the only city I know that God has placed his name on. Plus, what if they win the war, would they have an election and have somebody who's Jewish to run for office in Gaza?

I can't imagine there being an election because the people that would be voting would be the Gazans, and 300,000 of them at least are lenient with Hamas. So there may be some type of – I don't know the answer to this yet. It's a very good question, Lewis.

Whether it's going to be a military government during this period of engagement and after they get control of it, is it going to be international and the United Nations, we don't know that yet. But great question. Thank you for supporting the ACLJ, by the way. You too can become an ACLJ champion.

2,038 of you have. ACLJ.org forward slash champions. That means you're donating each and every month. You're standing with Israel this month. You're a champion for life, liberty, and freedom. As I said, we've got lawyers deployed on an election case in Denver, Colorado right now. We've got our government affairs team working on the Israel stuff in the United States and our office in Europe working on it over there. A lot going on at the ACLJ. ACLJ.org forward slash champions. Talk to you tomorrow.